The pictures of the original facade don't present the real choice, since all of that was apparently already gone and the place has looked like a dump for a long time. In fact, I don't see where Panchito's covered the sign any more than it already was. Somebody in the Village just doesn't like Mr. Englehardt, probably.

In a lot of California suburbs these days, I've noticed what I think is a very worthwhile compromise. Rebuilding is find, knock down the old--and mostly modern--buildings which sprang up in the 50s-70s, and replace them, all well and good. But each community has a set of aesthetic guidelines which helps not only preserve but indeed enhance a sense of community history and unity.

Some communities have a Western theme of sort, which means even strip malls have to fit into a range of color choices, architectural additions, and other options.

It's new, and creative, giving new owners the chance to advertise their own way, but in a way that doesn't make the whole place look like crap, which is what far, far too much of the construction prior to the last ten years looked like.

I used to live in a really neato-mosquito place, a gated enclave in Tokyo. Doubly gated, actually. It was on land that was previously an old Japanese air base. Their old hangers were still there. We used to play inside them even though they were fenced off too within the enclave. The houses were all gigantic, especially by Asian standards, and spaced ridiculously far apart. There was a field and an equipped playground in the center of each block so that each block had its own little park. The place was called Momote Village, it's housing serviced both Grant Heights-Narimasu and Tachikawa air bases. The compression of Tokyo proper began immediately outside the guarded gates and the contrast of land usages was stark even to a child. The whole time we lived there I kept thinking, "Damn, when the Japanese people take this over again eventually, they're going to freak out." I used Google Earth to have a look and it's gone! Gone, I tell you. Gone. Gone forever. Is there no humanity?

Ans: Yes, there is, a lot.

But you know what otallytay illskay me about this item? Little Pancho's Mexican food from a guy named Bob Engelhardt. I can smell the authenticity.

New York is always changing. People who move into a neighborhood want to pull the ladder up and keep it the way it was when they moved there ten years ago while the people who lived there all thier lives welcome a new supermarket or drycleaner.

The Village is a tourist trap much like Little Italy and Times Square. The real art scene is not even in Williamsburg or other so called "Bohemian" neighborhoods like Red Hook but rather in enclaves like Bushwick and Bed Stuy where the real poor struggling artists live. It's all a big bag of bullshit.

"The Village is a tourist trap much like Little Italy and Times Square."

Which means it's in the interest of many of the businesses there to have The Fat Black Pussycat facade preserved to lure tourists into the trap. It's a shame Englehardt didn't find a way to make a restaurant with that name and some pseudo-beatnik ambiance.

Everything changes. Nothing stays the same. If a municipality wants to preserve a site, they should buy it and make it a museum. If they aren't willing to justify the expense of doing that, they should just shaddup.

It's one thing to have a preservation district with rigid rules in places like the French Quarter in New Orleans, but is often counterproductive in areas of more varied and lesser historical value like The "Lower Garden Dist." just off the CBD where strict guide-lines prevent some really creative preservation/renovation of homes many of which are of dubious architectural value, (and as a result "renovation" simply results in replicating mediocrity)while areas further uptown in the "University Area" NOT in Historical Districts see dynamite renovations of homes of the same quality while preserving/paying true hommage to their historical origins/look as well..

"It's a shame Englehardt didn't find a way to make a restaurant with that name and some pseudo-beatnik ambiance."

When I was growing up the Village is where the Puerto Ricans from the Lower East Side would go to beat up and mug the hippies and the beatnicks. And the cops laughed because nobody likes beatnicks. Just sayn'

I don't know where Englehardt is from but there a lot of German named Mex-Texacans from south Texas. Linda Ronstadt is one of them. If he is one of them, his Mexican food is authentic. A lot of people don't really know what they think they know. Like those who think they know about Paul Revere.

Ever vote in one of these things, and then feel small and conformist when your choice falls into the 96% overvote section? And yet I keep telling people I'm not actually a libertarian.

Were the answers frontloaded to favor the first answer?

The Village they want preserved is, I suppose, Village 3.0, the one full of young homosexuals, hippies, and a few aging beatniks for flavor, I suppose? I once met an author, William Tenn and his wife, who talked longingly of the Village 2.0, which had been annihilated by this crowd. They fled the ruination of their Village for exile at a humble land-grant university, teaching English Lit.

The Life and Death of Great American Cities was mostly written with the Village 2.0 in mind, I think. Jane Jacobs lived there, after all.